Barbara Cartland and James Herriot might be passé these days but Danielle Steel's stories of drama, romance and betrayal in the lives of the rich have retained their grip on the hearts of the UK's readers over an astonishing period of 30 years, with the American author revealed today as the only writer to appear in every annual most-borrowed books chart since records began.

The novelist's books were borrowed just over 900,000 times from libraries last year, according to the latest library league table from Public Lending Right, making her the UK's fourth most-borrowed adult writer and the only author to retain a place in every top 10 most-borrowed authors list over the last 30 years. Back in 1983, when PLR records began, Steel sat in the charts in eighth position. Then, her most-borrowed cohorts included Catherine Cookson, Herriot and Cartland – a very different line-up to today's top library authors, who are nearly exclusively American thriller writers such as James Patterson, Harlan Coben and Michael Connelly.

Steel's publisher Catherine Cobain at Transworld put her enduring popularity – her books have been borrowed more than 42m times since 1999, a period over which she has sold an estimated 11m books – down to how she writes "very feelingly and honestly about the kind of issues real women face: finding love, taking care of a family and keeping them together against the odds, pursuing a dream or a career". Steel is also prolific, with 80 novels to her name to date.

She is just one of the host of American writers dominating the UK's library charts: in the top 20 most borrowed adult novels list, 17 are by US-based crime and thriller authors – and nine are written or co-written by James Patterson, who also takes the top slot with 10th Anniversary, co-written with Maxine Paetro and the UK's most borrowed book last year.

Despite the commercial and critical success of Hilary Mantel's novels last year, not a single "literary" title makes the top 20, with just Julia Donaldson's children's book The Gruffalo, Claire Freedman & Ben Cort's Aliens Love Underpants and the late Maeve Binchy's Minding Frankie flying the flag for the UK and Ireland's writers in the top 20.

For the sixth year running, Patterson remains the UK's most borrowed author, with his many novels borrowed over 2.4m times last year. He is joined in the most-borrowed author list by six children's writers – Daisy Meadows, the brand behind the Rainbow Magic series, Donaldson, Francesca Simon, author of the Horrid Henry series, Jacqueline Wilson, Kipper creator Mick Inkpen and the Beast Quest series' Adam Blade.

Roald Dahl sneaks into the author list in 14th position, and is the most borrowed classic author, ahead of Enid Blyton, Agatha Christie and Georgette Heyer. The most borrowed classic title was JD Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, beating To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee to the top spot, possibly following heightened attention to the author after his death in 2010.